MAM
Posterscope launches ROOH – Digital OOH Ad Exchange
MUMBAI: Posterscope India, the out-of-home specialist from Dentsu Aegis Network, has announced the launch of ROOH (Real Time Out Of Home), a unique planning-buying platform (including programmatic) for digital OOH inventories.
Based on the extensive use of APIs (application programming interface), Posterscope’s ROOH uses a wide variety of data feeds to create customised and targeted advertising. The tool aims to help Posterscope to further strengthen and bolster its real-time capabilities in India as billings from digital OOH are estimated to grow at a rate of 60 per cent by the end of 2019.
With the launch of ROOH, Posterscope India has collated and brought together more than 60,000 digital screens on a single platform. This tool not only uses analytics around the screen when consumers frequenting the location but also exploits Dentsu Aegis Network’s research, insights and planning tool – CCS (Consumer Connections Study Planner) along with Dan Explore (a tool that examines consumer passion points) to arrive at the right screen mix for the brand to help optimise the plan.
Posterscope Group South Asia group MD Haresh Nayak said, "The ability to deliver dynamic content in real time, driven by highly relevant data and optimised to audience type and audience mindset, represents an enormous leap in the power of the OOH medium. I am certain that it will attract new advertisers to the medium, particularly those that need highly flexible and agile brand communication."
ROOH senior vice president Deepak Kumar said, “Over the last two years, we have worked across 2500 towns, dealing with over 50 key media owners, to develop this tool. This has helped us in understanding and curating ROOH. The flexibility of ROOH will enable some interesting campaigns and will make OOH truly a dynamic medium. The Posterscope Group predicts that the year 2020 will be a defining year for real time out of home.”
During the test phase, Posterscope India activated programmatic triggers, specific to time and location, with multiple creatives on a limited number of screens to observe market reaction. “In turn, the agency observed exponential increase in client queries to understand the medium so that it could help them execute their campaigns more effectively. Currently, BFSI, mobile, e commerce and automobile categories are at the forefront of usage of this tool,” a press statement shares.
Only accessed by its planning team now, Posterscope will soon extend ROOH’s access to its clients and partners. ROOH will provide insights and data to them – right from the brief stage juxtaposed against consumer analytics that will help then detect and decipher the apt triggers for their campaign. Human intervention, then, will be limited and utilised only if necessary.
MAM
VML India lands two finalist spots at Cairns Hatchlings 2026
The Mumbai agency is back in Australia with two teams, a UN brief and 24 hours to impress
MUMBAI: VML India is heading to Australia again. The Mumbai-based creative agency has secured two finalist spots at the Cairns Hatchlings 2026 competition, one in the Audio category and one in Design, making it the only Indian agency to have reached the finals in both editions of the contest since its launch in 2025.
Four people will make the trip. Senior copywriter Shilpi Dey and senior art director Raj Thakkar will compete in Audio. Art directors Shabbir and Shruti Negi will go head-to-head with the world’s best in Design. The finals take place at the Cairns Convention Centre from 13th May, culminating in an awards ceremony on 15th May.
The work that got them there is worth examining. For the Audio category, Dey and Thakkar tackled a brief for LIVE LIKE MMAD with a campaign called Inner Voice, Interrupted. Using spatial audio techniques, the campaign recreates the overwhelming self-doubt that descends after a long workday, physically panning negative thoughts left and right before cutting the noise entirely to reveal a confident inner voice. Strategically targeted at commuters via Spotify during evening rush hours, the campaign reframes the hours after work as an opportunity for personal growth and charitable action.
For the Design category, Shabbir and Negi worked on a brief for Canteen’s Bandanna Day, a campaign highlighting how cancer pushes teenagers out of their own defining moments. Using a pixelated design language to create stark contrast between a blurred world of isolation and a focused world of connection, the campaign, titled The Flipside of Cancer, shows teenagers fading into the background of birthdays, skateparks and school proms. As a Canteen bandanna appears, the blur flips and the teenager snaps back into sharp focus.
Kalpesh Patankar, group chief creative officer of VML India, made no attempt to disguise his satisfaction. “We are immensely proud to see our teams consistently excel on the Cairns Hatchlings platform since its inception,” he said. “They have masterfully tackled challenging briefs across diverse categories, demonstrating both layered storytelling and a unique creative approach. This exceptional teamwork is truly inspiring.”
Dey and Thakkar, returning to the finals after last year’s run, were candid about the demands of the audio medium. “It’s one of the most demanding mediums, where we only have a few seconds to capture a listener’s world with sound alone, so absolute clarity is essential,” they said. “The true measure of creative work is its ability to create positive change, and our audio submission was made to help those who need it most while encouraging people to silence the inner voices that hold them back.”
Shabbir and Negi, competing in Design for the first time, described the experience as “a completely different beast.” “We see it as an opportunity to showcase our expertise, raise the bar, and challenge ourselves in new ways, while also learning from creative minds from across the globe,” they said.
In Australia, the four finalists will face a live 24-hour brief from the United Nations before presenting in a live pitch session. Twenty-four hours, one brief, one shot. VML India has been here before. It knows exactly what is at stake.
